Noah Wyle, The Only 'Er' Character To Stick It Out, Is Gone After Tonight

May 19, 2005|By MEGHAN DAUM The Los Angeles Times

On a chilly Wednesday night in late April, Noah Wyle stood before a mirror on a Warner Bros. soundstage and spoke what are among his last lines as Dr. John Carter, the "ER" physician he's played since the show began over a decade ago. "It's been 11 years," he said. "And I feel like I pretty much grew up with all of you guys."

It's a sentiment that resonates beyond the script for Wyle's last episode, which airs tonight on NBC. "Before that script came out I was thinking of using that line myself," Wyle said.

For all its incarnations, most viewers still associate "ER" with its original cast, which, along with Wyle, included George Clooney, Anthony Edwards, Eriq La Salle, Julianna Margulies and Sherry Stringfield.

The last remaining original cast member to leave the show (Stringfield rejoined the cast in 2001 after a five-year absence), Wyle has admitted to some exhaustion at the hands of Dr. Carter, who even by television standards experienced more in his 20s and early 30s than most of us do in a lifetime. From hapless medical student to seasoned physician, he survived medical residency, the pressures of his enormously wealthy family, a nearly fatal stabbing by a schizophrenic patient followed by drug addiction and rehab and, most notably, a life-changing volunteer stint as a doctor in war-torn Africa where he was nearly executed by soldiers. *